“This,” I say finally, voice rough, “is where the last war ended.”
She looks at the bones. At me. “And you were here.”
“Yeah.”
“Did you lose anyone?”
I don’t answer right away. My throat is raw. Finally, I nod once. “The only one that mattered.”
Her gaze softens, but she doesn’t reach for me. Doesn’t press. Just lets the silence speak.
The wind stirs through the flowers, rattling the bones like faint laughter. I close my eyes and hear it again—Derga’s laugh, bold and bright, long before the fire.
When I open them, River’s still watching me.
And for the first time in centuries, the ghost in my chest shifts. Not gone. Never gone. But lighter.
Because maybe—for the first time since Derga—I don’t feel alone in the ruin.
The ruins riseout of the mist like bones pushing through skin. Half-buried in moss, walls sagging, stones shifted by roots, they still hold the shape of something once proud. A tower maybe, or a chapel—dark elf craft, by the taste of iron dust in the mortar. Time chewed it down until only three walls stand and the roof lies open to the sky.
We take it for shelter. Firewood’s easy here—dead beams splinter under my claws, dry enough to crack. Soon the flameslick upward, warm against the night air. Sparks float toward the open ceiling and fade against the first pricks of starlight.
River settles opposite me, rifle propped within arm’s reach, boots unlaced, her weight resting heavy against a stone block. She stretches her sore leg once, winces, then pulls it back in. The fire paints her face in shifting gold and shadow.
For a while she says nothing. Just stares into the flames, expression unreadable. Then her mouth quirks, and her voice breaks the quiet.
“So,” she says, casual as throwing dice, “troll mating. How does that even work? You bash skulls until one gives up?”
I bark out a laugh, low and rumbling. “Headbutts are for fights, not beds.”
Her smirk widens, teasing. “Good. I’d hate to die of foreplay.”
“You wouldn’t last a round,” I shoot back.
Her eyebrow arches. “You that sure of yourself?”
“Been alive four hundred years. I don’t brag about things I can’t do.”
That gets her attention. Her eyes flicker toward me, just for a heartbeat, before she hides it behind another smirk.
I lean back against the ruin’s wall, let the shadows stretch long across me. “Truth is… troll women are rare. Always have been, since the curse. In four centuries, I’ve seen maybe five. Some trolls never lay eyes on one their whole lives.”
She grows still, listening.
“When a female’s born, the mountains themselves go quiet,” I continue. “Like the world knows it’s somethin’ precious. Whole clans fight just to protect one. The birthrate’s lower than a dry creek.”
Her voice softens, careful. “So… when you do meet one?”
I let the fire hold my eyes. Easier than looking at her. “It isn’t a choice. Not really. It’s… a knowing. Marrow-deep. Blood-deep.The world whispersthere she is, and from that moment, nothing else matters.”
The fire snaps, collapsing into glowing coals.
Finally I glance at her. She’s not smirking now. Not mocking. Just watching me with eyes dark and steady, the weight of them like a stone on my chest.
But she doesn’t answer me. Not with words. Instead she shifts, pulls her knees up, wraps her arms around them. The firelight flickers over her face, catching a shadow in her eyes that looks too much like memory.
After a while, she speaks. Her voice is quieter. Rougher.
